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The
rivalry between online and traditional retail will heat up during the 2017 holiday
season

Port Washington, NY, October 17, 2017 — On average, U.S. consumers anticipate doing nearly 40 percent of their 2017 holiday shopping online, up from one-third just two years ago, reports The NPD Group, a leading global information company. According to NPD’s 2017 Holiday Purchase Intentions Survey, consumers who will be holiday shopping online are planning to spend roughly 70 percent more than their in-store-only counterparts – online shoppers anticipate spending an average of $793 this holiday season and those who will only shop in brick-and-mortar stores plan to spend an average of $467.

“Online is going to play an increasingly critical role in the 2017 holiday shopping season,” said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst, The NPD Group,
Inc. “Retailers, big and small, recognize online retail’s importance and have been turning up the volume on their online strategy this year, which will only intensify during the holidays.”

NPD’s
Checkout
TrackingSM and Checkout
Tracking E-Commerce information shows that online purchase frequency of general merchandise categories during the holiday season has increased while in-store spending occasions have declined. During the fourth quarter of 2016, consumer e-commerce purchase frequency increased 12 percent to an average of more than 6 online orders, compared to brick-and-mortar stores, where consumers made an average of 18 purchases, a 4 percent decline from the prior year. Home improvement, beauty, apparel and technology were among the faster growing categories in terms of e-commerce purchase frequency. Beauty was one of the few categories which experienced purchase frequency growth at brick-and-mortar stores.

Almost three-quarters of holiday consumers plan to do some of their holiday shopping online this year, with even higher likelihood among Millennials and Gen X. Topping the list of anticipated holiday shopping destinations were online-only sites, like Amazon, Ebay, and Etsy, noted by 66 percent of consumers in this year’s Holiday Purchase Intentions survey. Mass merchants/discount stores, and their websites, were the second most popular planned destination, followed by national chains, and department stores.

“New online competition is emerging every day giving consumers more options, but also creating more noise and shopping confusion,” added Cohen. “The key for traditional retail continues to be an omni-presence approach that muffles that noise, synthesizes brick and click strategies, and keeps your brand top of mind for consumers throughout the holiday season.”

Methodology

The Holiday Purchase Intentions Survey is designed to better understand consumers’ shopping and spending intentions for the upcoming holiday season. An online survey was fielded in September 2017 among a US representative sample of NPD online consumer panel members. The survey was completed by 3,785 individuals aged 18 and older.

Checkout TrackingSM provides detailed information on consumer buying behavior, based on receipts for both online and brick-and-mortar retail purchases from the same consumers over time. Checkout Tracking delivers precise category, brand, and item-level purchase detail linked to buyers and their demographics, useful for analyzing competitive market baskets and identifying purchase patterns. Information is collected from more than 50,000 consumers from NPD’s receipt-harvesting mobile phone app and the scanning of more than 4 million in-boxes for e-receipts through Slice Intelligence.

According to NPD’s Checkout E-commerce Tracking, online sales of hard parts grew 29 percent in the last 12 months. Representing one-quarter of total sales, the brakes category is a particularly influential aspect of this market, as brake part buyers spend significantly more and make three-times as many online auto purchases.